Tag: American cars

Das Boattail: The 1971–1973 Buick Riviera

Bill Mitchell, styling chief of General Motors from 1958 to 1977, presided over quite a few hits and a number of duds in his long career. Some of those designs still spark controversy — few as much as this one. Critics were divided on this design when it first appeared and even today, there’s a love-it-or-hate-it attitude toward it. This week, the history of Buick’s infamous 1971–1973 “boattail Riviera.”

NOTE: This article, originally written in 2007, was revised extensively in November 2010 to correct a number of factual errors.

1972 Buick Riviera tail

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Mercury Falling: The Mercury Breezeway Sedans

What’s a Mercury? For the past 30 years or so, the Mercury badge has generally meant a re-trimmed Ford product with slightly different styling and features, offered mostly to give Lincoln-Mercury dealers something to keep them alive between Navigator and Town Car sales. Other than the “electric shaver” grille treatment of recent cars (reminiscent of the 1967 Mercury Cougar), there’s little of substance to differentiate a Mercury from its Ford sibling. Throughout Mercury’s roller-coaster 68-year history, however, FoMoCo has made periodic stabs at giving its ill-starred middle-class division a unique product to sell — like the 1963-1968 Mercury Breezeway sedans.

1964 Mercury Montclair Breezeway hood badge and headlights © 2010 Aaron Severson
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Mean Machine: The 1970-1974 Dodge Challenger

Successful car design is as much a matter of prognostication as engineering skill or styling acumen. To be successful, a design has to take into account not only where the market is now, but where it’s going to be three years from now. If you show up late to the dance, it may not matter how stylishly you’re dressed or how clever your moves may be. Dodge learned that the hard way in the early 1970s when it made its belated entry into the “pony car” market: the formidable but ill-fated 1970–1974 Dodge Challenger.
1970 Dodge Challenger R/T hood pin
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The Infamous 1980–1981 Pontiac Trans Am Turbo

This car’s engine has been much maligned and its muscular styling still conjures up bad memories of gold chains and exposed chest hair, a last gasp of disco-era glory. It was Pontiac’s first turbocharged production car, but it also brought down the curtain on a storied era of unique Pontiac engines. This is the story of the little-loved, often-forgotten Pontiac Firebird Trans Am Turbo.

1980 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am Turbo hood

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Room at the Top: The 1954 Pontiac Star Chief and Class Consciousness in America

For more than half of its 80-year history, the Pontiac Division of General Motors has tried, with varying degrees of success, to present itself as the hotshot of the GM line-up, with an advertising tagline proclaiming, “We Build Excitement.” Once upon a time, however, Pontiac was a stolid, sensible, rather dull family car whose claim to fame was that it was “priced just above the lowest.” To see what Pontiac used to be before Bunkie Knudsen went racing and John DeLorean twisted the tail of the Tiger, let’s take a look at the 1954 Pontiac Star Chief and Chieftain — the last boring Pontiacs.
1954 Pontiac emblem
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The Crown Corvair V-8

What does nearly every car produced anywhere since the days of the Model T have in common? Other than wheels, it’s the inevitability that sometime, somewhere, somebody has stuffed a small-block Chevy V8 into it. We’ve yet to hear of a V8 Prius and there might be a Russian ZiL or two that remains innocent of the Mouse Motor, but everything else from ’32 Fords to RX-7s, has at one time or another had the ubiquitous Chevrolet engine stuffed under the hood — or wherever else it might fit.

The author recent met some of the members of the South Coast CORSA (Corvair Society of America) chapter and had a chance to see some of the cars owned by the members. Aside from Greg Vargas’s cherry black Monza (pictures of which appeared in our recent Corvair article), we also came face to face with a highly unusual example of the Corvair breed: Chuck Rust’s Crown V8 Corvair, a car that is no longer quite a Corvair, but a Corv-8.
Crown Equipped sticker on a 1965 Crown V8 Corvair
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Dodging the Issue: Dodge’s 1966-1967 Fastback Charger

Thanks to The Dukes of Hazzard, most Americans are familiar with the sleek, late-sixties Dodge Charger, but the General Lee was actually the second generation of Dodge’s sporty car; the first was the original Coronet-based fastback Charger, a peculiar-looking car born of desperation and bitter sibling rivalry. This is the story of the 1966-1967 Dodge Charger.
1966 Dodge Charger rear 3q view
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Razor-Sharp Style: The 1963–1965 Buick Riviera

From 1958 to 1977, the head of General Motors Styling was William L. (Bill) Mitchell, protégé and anointed successor of the legendary Harley Earl. Mitchell was just as contentious and flamboyant as his mentor, but his tastes were somewhat more restrained, bringing about a new era of crisp, confident styling that was perfectly suited to the prevailing mood of the early 1960s. One of the best designs of Mitchell’s tenure — and one of his personal favorites — was the 1963–1965 Buick Riviera, a stylish coupe that finally put GM on the map in the lucrative personal luxury market. But if things had gone according to plan, the Riviera wouldn’t have been a Buick at all, and it came to market only after a strange and complicated journey of missed opportunities, corporate politicking, and sibling rivalry.

1965 Riviera hood ornament close-up © Aaron Severson

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Take Me to Your Style Leader: The 1938–1942 Cadillac Sixty Special

For nearly five decades, Cadillac was the standard-bearer for luxury cars in America. That dominance was not won through technical innovation or forward-thinking product development, but through styling leadership. Although the division produced some gorgeous cars in the early thirties that are acknowledged as classics, Cadillac’s position as a true styling leader can be traced to one car: the 1938-1941 Cadillac Sixty Special. This enormously influential model was laden with then-radical features that have since become the industry norm. The Sixty Special also launched the career of William L. (Bill) Mitchell, GM styling chief Harley Earl’s eventual successor and one of the most influential men in the history of the American automobile. This is the story of the Sixty Special.

1941 Cadillac Sixty Special nose badge
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Last Time Around: The 1971–1976 Cadillac Eldorado Convertible

Thirty years ago, many believed this car would be the last American convertible. It wasn’t, but it did mark the end of the line for that uniquely American concept: the full-sized open car. This is the history of the 1971-1976 Cadillac Eldorado convertible.
1976 Cadillac Eldorado convertible script
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The Summer of John Z: John DeLorean and the Pontiac Firebird

Designing, building, and marketing new cars is expensive, even for the largest automakers. If they’re strapped for cash (e.g., BMC in the fifties and sixties) or overcome by hubris (e.g., General Motors in the eighties), it’s tempting to share platforms between models or even slap a new grille a new badge on an existing model and pass it off as a new product for a different division — a technique sometimes called badge engineering. As confusing and potentially alienating as badge engineering can be for consumers, imagine how the people at their divisions feel when they’re handed an existing product and told to make something new and different out of it. Such was the case with Pontiac’s “pony car,” the 1967–1969 Pontiac Firebird and Firebird Trans Am.
1967 Pontiac Firebird badge
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First, Foremost: The First-Generation Chevrolet Camaro Z/28

Nobody, least of all Ford, expected General Motors to take the success of the Ford Mustang lying down. Still, it took two and a half years for the General to field its challenger, the Chevrolet Camaro, and despite the Camaro’s fresh styling, a broad selection of engines, and a blinding array of options, the Mustang outsold it two to one.

If they couldn’t beat the Mustang on the showroom floor, Chevrolet decided, they would at least beat it at the track. GM was not officially in racing, but that didn’t stop Chevrolet engineers from concocting a fearsome homologation special to qualify their new baby for Trans Am competition: the Camaro Z/28. This is the story of the 1967-1969 Chevrolet Camaro and Z/28.
1969 Chevrolet Camaro badge
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